Happy New Year! Hope everyone had a lovely Christmas break. I overdid the decorations as usual, but loved having a twinkly house and really miss all the sparkly lights now that they are back in the cupboard.

The freezing weather and long dark nights mean I often succumb to the January Blues but not this year. I am skin cancer-free, at least for now, and I have so much to look forward in the first months of 2025.

My second school reading book, The Last Zeppelin, another real-life story of survival after Terror on Titanic, is coming out with Badger Learning in January.

My story for 6-8 year olds, The Stargazers, is coming out as part of BBC Scotland’s Time for a Story series early this year and I am so looking forward to seeing the illustrations and listening to the added sound effects! Recording the story at the BBC Studios in Glasgow was great fun.

Phoebe misses out on playing in the snow, but a cloudless night sky is perfect for stargazing. Phoebe and her Gran decide to try and see the stars from her dark garden.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p07jntrp/episodes/guide

In March I’m going to London to take part in the Alexandra Palace Children’s Book Awards, as Ice Cream Boy has been shortlisted and I’ve been invited to the big award ceremony. Ice Cream Boy has also been shortlisted for Peters Books Children’s Book of the Year and longlisted for the James Reckitt Hull Children’s Book Award which is totally thrilling. The novel is now also available as an audiobook, narrated by Angus King and is currently being reprinted. I am so proud of how well the book has been received.

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I’m looking forward to taking part in a couple of lovely book festivals in the spring too so it is shaping up to be an excellent few months.

Writing-wise, I took procrastination very seriously in 2024 and know that I need to get my head down and write a first draft of a new novel between January and April 2025, so it is back to the serious business of daily word counts and Written? Kitten! (You can choose puppies if you prefer -whatever positive reinforcement works)

https://writtenkitten.co/

There is also some very exciting book news hopefully coming soon, which I am bursting to talk about.

On a final, personal note, I am loving looking after my little granddaughter every Tuesday. We visit the library in Kirkintilloch often and this week had a fab afternoon out to the Riverside Museum in Glasgow where we spotted the perfect transport to take us home. Looking forward to lots more days out this spring!

It has been a good summer, work-wise. I’ve been involved in some lovely bookish events, including Marr College’s first Book Festival and The Big Book Show at the Mitchell Library.

It was a real thrill to be invited to Arran’s Wee Mac Book Festival, Falkirk High’s Literacy Celebration event, Gryffe Valley Book Festival and the Summer Reading Challenge launch event at Paisley Central Library too!  I attended some lovely bookish social events, like the Children’s Publishing Picnic, and did lots of school events, both in-person and virtual. I even did my first zoom to Australia in June!

The new term has got off to an excellent start. I’ve been doing a six-week block of creative writing sessions with a brilliant group of young writers at the Ginger Cat Bookshop.  Joyously, in September I was invited to the opening of two gorgeous new school libraries, at King’s Park Primary in Glasgow and King’s Oak Primary in Greenock.

Being a children’s author  really is the best job in the world and it has also been a lovely distraction from some tricky real-life issues. My dad is struggling now with dementia, although he’s pretty upbeat most of the time and is very happy to chat about Morrison shelters and the Clydebank Blitz. And I’ve had my own health issue, as a tiny, innocuous looking mole under my lip turned out to be another melanoma. I had a wide local excision in August and went to Birmingham  NEC two days later to sign copies of The Titanic Detective Agency at White Star Heritage’s excellent Titanic exhibition.

I was at the exhibition for the whole weekend and while I thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to chat about Titanic to other enthusiasts, I felt very self-conscious about the state of my face!  Thankfully, my lip is healing nicely now, I’m crossing my fingers I won’t need more surgery and feel enormously grateful to the NHS staff for their care and kindness.

May was an exciting and slightly chaotic month!  Ice Cream Boy came out with Floris Books on the 16th. The virtual blog tour, organised by the fabulous Kelly Lacey, really added to the buzz and Ice Cream Boy got some thoughtful and detailed early reviews. Huge thanks to Kelly and to all the lovely bloggers who joined the tour.

The week before Ice Cream Boy’s launch,  I managed inadvertently to get myself in a social media spat with Matt Lucas, which got so out of hand it led to me being interviewed on Radio 5 Live and appearing in an article in the Independent newspaper.

The amount of attention it got felt a little overwhelming but I am glad my tweet started a very necessary conversation. The support from other children’s authors was amazing. Having said that, I’m not holding my breath that anything will change as a result.

A lot was said on social media during that week about writing quality and ghost writers, but I wasn’t actually complaining about the fact so many celebrities are creating children’s books. I was just feeling frustrated at the privilege of shelf space and marketing celebrity authors are offered. It isn’t a level playing field and to be honest, there have been times I’ve felt like my own books are so under the radar that maybe I should consider throwing in the towel.

But like Matt Lucas, I’ve taken time to reflect. Fame isn’t something I’d relish. Wealth would be nice, and my bills need to be paid, but most of my income as an author comes from visiting schools and libraries and that’s my favourite part of the job.  I’ve spent almost my entire working life encouraging young children to love stories and as a children’s author, inspiring kids to read and write for pleasure is still my main motivation. I know how lucky I am to be doing a job I love.

Ice Cream Boy’s launch was on the 30th and I am very grateful to everyone at Floris and to the staff at Waterstones Braehead for organising such a lovely event. There was ice cream and cake and lots of people came, which is always a big relief!

Now I just have to cross my fingers and hope that readers will enjoy Ice Cream Boy. Hopefully the weather will warm up and and an ice cream themed book will seem the perfect beach read this summer.

Yesterday, I found these scribbled notes , written in December 2021, and while they’re hard to read, I’m glad I wrote it all down and find the final few lines particularly interesting.

March 2020-lockdown- all school author visits cancelled. No paid work. Can’t write. Can’t focus. Horrendous anxiety about Covid, particularly as my daughter Sal is working in covid wards with rubbish PPE.
April-October 2020 Very anxious. doom scrolling constantly. Hair is falling out. pains in my side and insomnia. Scan shows gallstones. Sal gets Covid, is ill for three weeks and I can’t go and see her. Pain in side is getting more intense and often.
November-emergency 2020 op on necrotic gallbladder. Get out of hospital and have to go into isolation for 14 days as patient on ward had covid.
December- A & E in agony – MRi scan – small bile duct stones diagnosed. Quiet Christmas. Mum deteriorating badly. 
Jan- June 2021 helping to care for mum at home- final stages of dementia. School visits on zoom- 2 or 3 a week. Try and have two nights away in May and have to rush back as mum gets a UTI and is poorly.
July 3rd Mum dies. Ian has a heart attack same day. Organise funeral. Visit Ian in hospital. Feel totally shattered but get on with it.
Sept-Dec 2021 New book comes out {Secrets of the Last Merfolk} Trying to promote it, despite all the current barriers, and do school visits both virtual and in-person, start author in residence at Cumbrae Primary, start a new novel about dementia. Join a gym. start yoga and Spanish classes. Trying to get myself back together.

So, it’s now the 1st of May 2024. I still go to the gym three times a week and to my yoga class on Fridays. The Spanish classes ended but I’m still learning Spanish on Duolingo every day without fail. And reading those old notes gives me a real sense that I managed to get myself back together.

The new novel about dementia, Ice Cream Boy, is coming out this month and I am so excited and positive about getting it into the hands of young readers. I am even having a proper in-person launch with wine and cake, my first since 2019.
Ice Cream Boy is dedicated to my mum.

It was in early January 2014 that I decided to enter the Kelpies Prize and it was definitely a life-changing decision!  I am so glad that I decided to ‘chunk the challenge’ and wasn’t overwhelmed by the prospect of writing 40K words in six weeks. The first draft of The Mixed-Up Summer of Lily McLean was sent off with only a couple of days to go before the end of February closing date. Then all I had to do was cross my fingers and hope. You can see by my expression how thrilled I was when the golden envelope was opened and I was told The Mixed-Up Summer was going to be published.

So, after ten years of writing children’s novels, has being a published author been all that I imagined?  The answer is probably no! Some aspects have been beyond my wildest dreams; being nominated for the Carnegie Medal and signing 200 free books for pupils at the Edinburgh Festival School Gala Day both spring to mind. But when I stood on that tiny stage clutching my giant comedy cheque, I had no idea that publication didn’t mean I’d won the race. I was at the starting line – and I’d entered one of those Tough Mudder endurance runs by mistake.

To be honest, I was  totally clueless when my debut novel came out.  I’d no idea that 10,000 children’s novels are published in the UK every year and that it’s not a level playing field. The world of children’s publishing is dominated by celebrities and frankly, my cat gets more likes on social media than I do.

My books have not flown magically into the hands of delighted readers. A LOT of hard work has been required to get noticed at all and sometimes, the constant effort can feel overwhelming. I am so grateful for the support I have received from my local Waterstones branches and from independent bookshops, particularly The Ginger Cat in Bridge of Weir and The Book Nook in Stewarton. Last year, I loved doing creative writing workshops at the Ginger Cat and have enjoyed some fab school events with The Book Nook.

Ten years ago, I was also naive about author income. At the beginning, I fondly imagined that I might one day be able to live on my royalties but soon realised that was never going to be a possibility. If I was going to make a living as a writer, my income would need to come from school, festival and library visits. But over the last ten years, school budgets have come under increasing strain and now I am often asked to do free visits. Unless there’s a particular reason, I say no, partly because I don’t want to undermine other authors and partly because my bills need to be paid!

Luckily, I’ve got my priorities worked out now and try and play to my strengths. As an ex-primary teacher , I really want to encourage reading for pleasure, so I’ve sent hundreds of letters to schools this year, in an effort to inspire young readers. I’m also keen to support teachers, so I create  comprehensive teachers resources for all of my novels and it’s an amazing buzz to know that my books, The Titanic Detective Agency in particular, are being read in schools all over the UK.

Ten years later, fame and riches have not materialised and there are daily frustrations (often the banging head against a wall sort) but I have no regrets about becoming a children’s author. Every time I get a lovely message from a parent telling me I’ve inspired their child or from a young reader saying they love my books, I feel I’ve won that Tough Mudder race after all.